Does anyone still use this great winter steelhead fly?

[Dave McNeese]

The Drain's 20 date back to the early season of 1947 when Wes Drain landed his big steelhead on this delicate pattern. After 60 seasons does this fly still exist?
First photo is of the two Drain's 20 that I tied today. Second photo is of Colius christina sulphur butterflies under study.
The two tone body of Fluorescent Floss veiled by Yellow Toucan and Reddish Cock of the Rock glow together perfectly, with a sparse topping of Grey Squirrel wing . Toucan and Cock of the Rock have always been expensive, but well worth the money on such a fine pattern.
If one would like to fish the Drain's 20 as it was first tied, to celebrate it's 60th season, I will tie up you one to USE and report back to me on the amount of time spent fishing the fly, etc... I believe this pattern to be the first UV refective fly tied for steelhead and would like to see it have a good workout this season.
This ties in with my study on UV reflective scales on butterflies and feathers. For example, redwing blackbird shoulder feathers or yellow sulphur butterflies.
Please PM me with your phone number and address.

Thanks,
Dave McNeese
(503) 779-9073

[Matt Burke]

Holy cow Dave, what a great looking fly. No, I don't think I've seen that tie before. I'll PM my address. Talked with my girl, we are going to try to stop by on the way to San Deigo. Will call you first.

[Don Stracener]

That Drain 20 is a great looking fly.

I don't have those materials to make my own so if your offering to tie one I'll take you up on that.

[halcyon]

Dave,

I would suggest you consider resizing your images to 600 x 400 pixels so they load quickly and do not require scrolling to see. I am using a very fast cable connection and still have to wait inordinately long for the image to load. Thanks.

Regards,

[Preston]

Dave,
I was asked to tie a few flies to stuff some beautiful handmade wooden fly boxes to be raffled off at the Washington Fly Fishing Club's Christmas party. With winter coming on, I decided to tie a few of the Pacific Northwest's classic steelhead flies. While Drain's 20 was not one of the ones I chose to tie, it did get me thinking about some of the beautiful and effective old flies that seem to have fallen out of use these days. My final selection was: the Skykomish Sunrise, Brad's Brat, Purple Peril, Polar Shrimp, Frank Headrick's Hellcat and two versions (claret and orange) of a little-known Ken McLeod pattern that I can't even find a name for.

They are all fairly simple patterns but I suspect that they are as effective as many more modern flies. I've tied up a few more than I need for the fly boxes and intend to fish them this season.

[Willie Bodger]

Very nice fly Dave. Would you be willing to tie one for a steelhead virgin? And maybe include tying instructions as well?

Willie

[Skilly]

Dave

I also have a couple for you to try. I will give you a call and get your address.

Skilly

[Hywel]

Lovely ties - and one of my favorite patterns, Dave!

On an aside, I still have a dial-up Internet connection and the download was well worth the time.

Thanks for sharing your wonderful work.

Hywel

[Dave McNeese]

Halcyon, Sorry I kept you waiting. Id be happy to change it if you give me instructions how to do it.
Dave

[Bert Kinghorn]

Yes, and it is a great fly!

I'd be lying through my teeth if I promised to fish a fly you gave me, though. It would end up in a special box with treasures tied by Lemire, Kinney, Wulff, etc.

[halcyon]

Halcyon, Sorry I kept you waiting. Id be happy to change it if you give me instructions how to do it.
Dave

Well your images are fine and the subjects are superb so the only thing is resizing them. You have two options which you can use each alone or in combination. You will need some editing software such as that which comes with the Windows or Mac operating systems or preferably a program such as Photoshop, or the like. First, in many of your shots there is lots of space around the flies so you could "crop" to show the flies with less background and cut the size this way. Second, you can resize the image directly by using the editing software and changing the "image size" to 600 by 400 or 600 wide by a proportional height using the "image size" control in your edit program. Finally, you can crop the image and then resize the cropped image to get it to the final size you want. In any case, save the file as a "high resolution" JPG format image.

If you let me know exactly what software you have to edit images I or someone familiar with that particular software could give you step by step instruction.

Regards,

[Dave McNeese]

Don and all,
I'm doing a survey to see if this old classic still works.
Yes I am offering to tie you a Drains 20 to fish this season and then report back to us how it produces. This fly has great colors and in theory should still work.
I need your name, address and phone number and promise to fish it and let me know how it went. I will post final results after the season. Feel free to post your personal results on this thread as you wish.

Sincerely,
Dave

[Dave McNeese]

Preston,
The way you tie your wings is spectacular. They really look fishy. I want to tie like you someday!

Halcyon, thanks for the info, I will try, but can't promise results! Where is that teenager when I need him?


Hywel, Willie, Don and Bert
Thank you kindly for your compliments. I am honored and in good company with all of you fantastic tyers and fishermen.

Best regards,
Dave

[Norseman1]

Pm on the way Dave

Thank you

Best regards
Paul

[Steve Rohrbach]

Dave, one of the most wonderful parts of this fly fishing community is the willingness of the experts to share their knowledge. Today I have been treated to your fly, Preston's frequent contributions regarding flies or species and Les Johnson's views on Coastal Cutthroat.

I would love to fish Drain's 20 and promise to report back on the results. Thanks for sharing.

Best regards,
Steve Rohrbach
PM with details on the way

[Davy]

Mr. Preston === those are FANTASTIC. It would hard for me to choose a favorite fly between a Umpqua Special and a Skykomish Sunrise and you have dressed it and the others superbly sir.

[James Mello]

I'd love to fish one of those flies! I can think of some OP rivers under low water conditions that the '20 would work well on. If you can post the specific materials you used, I'll poke around a bit and see if I can't find some. At the worst, I may have to substitute the Cock of the Rock and the Toucan :)

[Davy]

Hey James, if you ask real nice , McNeese has a great sub for Toucan , but you have to ask real nice, beg even. Ok I do, maybe he will just set you up with some. LOL

[Dave McNeese]

What is your phone # and address and you get flies to fish with real feathers.

Dave McNeese

[Preston]

Dave,
I was talking to local guide John Farrar yesterday and he said he had a good picture of Drain's 20 (which Drain called Pool and Riffle before taking his 20+ pounder on it) which he would send to me. The fly in the picture was tied by Drain himself. I guess I had forgotten what a beautiful fly it is, the only picture I could find was in one of Trey Combs' books and was too small to give any impression of the details.

[Preston]

Hmmm, after looking over the recipe for Drain's 20, I see that the picture John sent me lacks a few significant details (toucan, cock-of-the-rock, and the wing material don't seem to match). This makes me wonder if John's statement that it was tied by Wes Drain was accurate. Any suggestions for a cock-of-the-rock substitute? I think I'd like to tie up a few for use this winter.

[Dave McNeese]

Preston,
The fly is an old one, John Farrar thought it was from the 50's. This is a variation and as Wes told me he not always had the two feathers available(toucan, cock of the rock). I tied the body the same , but with a different color of wing.. white, purple, red, and black polar bear. Did Wes do the same..?
Feathers were tough to get after WWll, then came the Korean conflict and feather suppliers had a tough time importing except central europe feather merchants. These feather merchants had anything for a price, and only a few U.S. shops got feathers through.. like Jimmy Deren. I spoke to Ted Niemeyer last night about the "20", since he has examined many collections over the years, thought Wes tied several types before the BIG fish that landed the name.
Flies are going out to all on Monday.

Thanks for sharing your flies and experiences

Dave McNeese

[Kevin Giusti]

Hey Dave would love to participate in the study! Will pm you with my info. Great idea! Kevin

[Davy]

all you fine anglers recieving these flys from Dave are gonna be amazed. I have just seen the flys ya'll are gettin..... I recommend using 65 lb Maxima tippet to avoid losing them. Better to break the rod and the arm and straighten the fly than lose it, no????

Now if I can just figure out how to interupt that shipment....hmmmmm,LOL. Nice flys Dave!!!!!

[Matt Burke]

I met the infamous Dave McNeese last Sunday and picked up my fly. Actually, he tied it right in front of me. What an amazing thing to see Dave tie. I’ve been tying so many fishin’ flies that I’ve forgotten all subtleties. The way he lays the thread all evenly spaced, material of a quality I’ve not seen or can buy at a local shop and the stories that go along with demonstration were fascinating. Truly, a master at the tying bench. His hospitality for a short visit were far more than I knew possible with kids running around, kittens and horses everywhere, in the midst of moving, etc. he still took time out to tie me a fly. If everyone were as kind and generous as Dave, the world would be a much better place. Thank you Dave.

[Ned Wright]

Hello Dave,

I would be honored to fish this fly. I am a steelhead newbie, so no promises on the quality of the data I will return to you, but I will send you information on the amount of time the fly was on the river, what river, flow conditions (high, low, in shape), weather (sunny, cloudy or rainy (being a UV fly and all)) and number of strikes (I can't promise that I will land them:mad: ) and/or success rate. I you want any information in particular, let me know.

In pm you mentioned size. I would guess that 8 or 10 would be best, but anything from 6 to 12 would be fished. I will only be bank fishing on small to medium steelhead rivers in the south sound/sw washington. Possibly the penninsula, but no guarantees.

PM sent with address and phone #

Thanks for the opportunity,
Give me a call if you have questions,
Ned Wright

[seanengman]

PM Sent. I too am a steelie newbie. I am planning a trip to the Grand Ronde Dec. 30 and 31 so if your offer is still up, I would be more than happy to give that fly a try.

[Steve Rohrbach]

Dave, the fly arrived the weekend. It is stunning. I am really looking forward to getting it into the water. I will post a report as soon as it happens. This is going to be great fun.
Best regards, Steve

[Don Stracener]

Dave,

The flies are fantastic!

Since I haven't spent a lot of time on the water a friend has been fishing the heck out of your flies.

Three days fishing just that fly and nothing yet. He lives on the river and fishes every day. I'll tell you just putting that fly in the water was something, all you want to do is look at it.

As for a substitute for those feathers. The main feature, besides good looking, is the UV properties of the feathers. Just matching the colors would not do the job.Your substitute would have to have those UV properties.

Will keep you posted.

[Scott Behn]

Hi Dave I know this might be a little late, but just saw your post on wanting to try an experiment with the Drain 20. I would love to try it on my local water up here at the Pilchuck and Skykomish Rivers if you don't mind.

:cool:

[doublespey]

Wow - fly arrived and I'm beyond impressed. As Davy suggested, 65lb test minimum. <g> Beautiful fly I will certainly enjoy fishing this coming spring season.

The colors in this fly really work together. Examine in a dark room with different back-lighting and you'll see what I mean!

Thanks Dave -this should be an interesting experiment!

Brian

[Norseman1]

Got the flies Dave.

Thanks very much, they are wonderful, and will no doubt get a good workout. Whenever I finish this basement drywalling:beathead: :beathead:

Thanks so much for the artwork. I will send you some of the Coquihalla series of Tommy Brayshaws era. Nice to see the oldies still working their magic.

Thanks again, you send flies to a total stranger who simply wants to fish a legend....it speaks well of your character sir. I tip my hat to you

Best regards
Paul

[Big Tuna]

I received mine as well and would echo the sentiments of others...beautiful fly and what a generous act. I had the added pleasure of talking at length with Dave about the experiment. Fascinating and illuminating conversation. I learned a great deal, not just about the UV/florescent effect, but a great deal more. Thanks, Dave:beer2:

[Steve Rohrbach]

Tuna, I shared the topic of my in-depth conversation with Dave with a friend who is the former head of the National Zoo in Washington DC. He is going to do some additional research and feature the topic in an informal monthly newsletter that he shares with friends and colleagues. I will forward you a copy when it is published Dave.

Best regards, Steve

[John Hicks]

After a brief conversation with Dave I plan on using this fly extensively this comming year on the Gaspe. This is going to be a great experiment. I'm currently trying to recruit some more help with this from the locals up there.

[Big Tuna]

Tuna, I shared the topic of my in-depth conversation with Dave with a friend who is the former head of the National Zoo in Washington DC. He is going to do some additional research and feature the topic in an informal monthly newsletter that he shares with friends and colleagues. I will forward you a copy when it is published Dave.

Best regards, Steve

Steve,
I'd appreciate that. Thanks.

Jon

[o mykiss]

This pattern can be found in Randy Stetzer's Best 1000 Flies (I think that's the title, or some variation of that). I've tied it and fished it, to no avail. But that can be said of virtually every fly I've tied and fished for winter steelhead.:(

[John Hicks]

The idea of flourecense and strike behavior will be interesting to see. The male and female Atlantic Salmon (salmo salar) of the Gaspe peninsula come into the rivers at different times of the year. This will allow me to affectively fish this fly to both males and females. It is interesting to me the effectivness of certain flies on certain fish. Dave are you able to use this material on different patterns?

as for the flies for the study I need a size 2 for early season high water fish and a size 6 or 8 if possible for summer low water fish.

[speyfisher]

What a great offer from one of the steelhead greats! PM sent. I would be honored to fish this fly in my local waters. Please make it on the small side. We are 150+ river miles from the sea. This is going to be interesting as those of us who swing the classic style flies are definitely in the minority around here.

[Davy]

This is going to be interesting as those of us who swing the classic style flies are definitely in the minority around here.

Seems that way, doesn't it?